UvA votes | Fifteen student parties to take part in UvA elections
This year, 15 different parties will compete for seats in the Central Student Council and the seven faculty councils. This was announced this afternoon by the UvA’s central electoral committee. During the student council elections, which begin on 11 May, several new parties will also participate.
In a public session this afternoon, the central electoral committee of the University of Amsterdam announced which parties will take part in the student council elections in just over two weeks. In total, 15 parties will compete for seats in the Central Student Council (CSR) and the faculty student councils (FSRs) of the seven faculties. Most of these groups also participated last year, although two new names – Lampara and Meteoor – will appear on the central list this year.
New parties
Lampara is a splinter group from the Activist Party, originating from the Faculty of Humanities (FGw). Lead candidate Alivia Peterli is currently the chair of that faculty’s FSR, while number two, Io Carpiso, is the current vice-chair. Both Peterli and Carpiso were still on the Activist Party’s list last year. In addition to the CSR elections, Lampara will also take part in the faculty elections at FGw. The second new party, Meteoor, is only participating in the CSR elections.
Although there have been some shifts, the total number of parties participating in the central elections remains at six. Two parties that failed to secure a CSR seat last year are not returning. The Sefa Student Party – a faculty-specific party from the Faculty of Economics and Business – will limit itself this year to the faculty elections after an unsuccessful attempt to gain a central seat last year. The far-right Vrijmoedige Studentenpartij, which already fell apart earlier this year following internal unrest, is entirely absent from the candidate lists.
Familiar names
The other four parties participating in the central elections are now well-established. The radical left-wing Activist Party currently holds six seats in the CSR and is once again aiming to become the largest party, this time with Carlos Fitton Gomez, current chair of the FSR of the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences (FMG), as its lead candidate. The lead candidates of the liberal party De Vrije Student (Anastacia Piersma), the leftist UvASociaal (Sára Bystrovová), and the international party INTER (Constanza Planas Buendia) are all currently active in faculty councils.
Another notable feature of the lists is their continued growth. The Activist Party and UvASociaal have each put forward 69 candidates, compared to 53 and 62 last year. This is striking, considering that only seven seats are available through the central elections.
The current distribution of the CSR seats:
Faculty student councils
There is also plenty of choice at the faculty level this year. Across the seven faculties, a total of 14 different parties are participating. Competition is particularly strong at the Faculty of Economics and Business, where six groups are competing for ten seats. In addition to the central student parties, several faculty-specific groups are also participating, such as LIEF (FNWI), MFAS (FG), and The Founding Students (FdR).
Even at the dentistry faculty ACTA – where traditionally only the party Kies Acta runs – there is something to choose this year: 13 students have put themselves forward for the eight available seats. The only exception is the Child Development and Education subdistrict (FMG), where, as in previous years, no candidates have come forward.
Turnout
The key question for the upcoming elections is whether the upward trend in turnout will continue. For years, student participation remained low, consistently hovering around 12 percent. Since 2023, however, a clear shift has been visible. After a jump to 16.2 percent in 2023 and a slight stabilisation in 2024, a historic high was reached last year: in 2025, no less than 21.5 percent of students cast their vote.
From 11 May, every eligible student will receive a personal invitation at their UvA email address. All UvA students can vote and will receive a voting link in their inbox. Voting is open until 19 May. The results of the elections will be announced on Friday, 22 May, in the Muziekzaal of CREA on the Roeterseiland Campus.
